


Big Energy in Little Spaces

by Taniwha



Category: Ghost Adventures RPF
Genre: Aaron Is Well Liked But Not Always Well Treated, Assault, Demons, Friends to Lovers, Friendship/Love, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Non-Graphic Rape/Non-Con, Original Characters - Freeform, Other, Possessive Behavior, Season 8 - Lost Episode, Sexual Violence
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-08-16
Updated: 2015-08-27
Packaged: 2018-04-15 03:03:08
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Rape/Non-Con
Chapters: 4
Words: 8,344
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4590582
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Taniwha/pseuds/Taniwha
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The Ghost Adventures Crew locks themselves into the Whittlock Arms Hotel where it is rumoured the amorous spirit of a murdered woman likes to roam the halls and climb into the beds of male guests.  It is also where a particularly nasty demon has been known to viciously attack pregnant women in the basement.  </p><p>It's a pity that no one warns them about the man in room 333.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Aaron

**Author's Note:**

> As this work is RPF we're going to treat it as an AU, because I don't actually know these people and do not actually wish any harm upon them.

“Aaron will go back to the third floor on his own, while Nick and I will go down to the basement and try to call out the demon that scratched Stacey Luddle.”

“Oh, man,” Aaron groaned theatrically, half for the camera he knew Nick had pointed at his face and half because even though he’d known these guys for almost a decade, he still couldn’t believe the balls these two guys had. “You are some brave dudes.”

He was a little bummed he was being sent to the third floor. He didn’t mind being sent on his own anymore - he’d learned over the years how to manage his fear and turn it into a productive form of baiting for the spirits. It usually gave them some pretty decent activity. He’d also learned through experience that there was really no point in arguing with Zak unless he was a hundred and twenty percent convinced Zak was wrong, otherwise, when Zak turned his voice soft and started gently pushing, Aaron would just give in like a cardboard box beneath the weight of his wheedling. But this time he couldn’t help feeling as though it was a dud assignment. On the walk-through yesterday they’d not felt anything, no atmospheric changes, no goosebumps or presences at all on that floor, and the first sweep they’d conducted during their lockdown produced equal amounts of nada. No audible EVP’s, no responses on the Spirit Box, and aside from an odd lonely squawk from the PX device in the stairwell, no unexplained noises. If the spirit of Nina Kelley was up there, she was playing hard to get. Which, from all the stories the interviewees were over-eager to share with Zak, didn’t sound like her usual thing. Rumour had it she was a rather handsy spirit.

“And Aaron, turn on the sexy for her, will you?” Zak murmured, loud enough for the cameras audios to catch. “She’s been without for quite a while.”

“And she’s gonna stay without, G!” Aaron laughed. “She ain’t my type. _You’re_ the ladyghostkiller. Remember Jerusha?”

“The ladyguykiller, too,” Nick supplied, and his smile was wide on the screen of Aaron’s camera. What the ladies would probably call _charming_.

The noise Zak made was hilarious. “The _what?!_ Dude, when?!”

Aaron snickered. “I think you mean the _guy_ ghostkiller, Bro.”

Nick shrugged, unconcerned, and Zak sounded no less affronted at the correction. “And I repeat: _when_?”

“In those tunnels beneath the bar, remember?” Nick reminded him cheerfully. “The people smuggling? There was that man’s voice on the Spirit Box and he wanted to be alone with you on the bed.”

Aaron laughed again, a full-bodied sound. “I remember that! And the prostitute wanted to get naked.”

“Bow-chika-bow-wow.”

In the small screen of Aaron’s camera he couldn’t tell if Zak’s face was flushed or not, but there was a wry smile curving at the edges of his lips and his eyebrows were high on his forehead. At least he wasn’t too annoyed by the teasing. Things were finally getting better with him.

“Yeah, well, can’t fault them for having good taste,” he muttered. “Anyway, time’s-a-wastin’. Get goin’ Aaron; and Nick, let’s go rustle us up a demon.”

“Sounds good to me,” was Nick’s response. 

“Aye-aye, Captain.” Aaron gave a lazy salute, which probably went unseen by camera. He watched through the tiny LCD screen while the two of them headed toward the kitchen and consequently through to the basement, only turning to head up the stairs when they had vanished completely from view.

It was pitch black. It was always pitch black at these indoor lockdowns. Using only the tiny screen on his night vision camera to navigate, Aaron silently expressed his disgust for wide staircases. Narrow ones were easier to tackle in the dark, all they required was for him to pick a wall and walk beside it to keep steady. Climbing wide ones in the dark one-handed was an utter bitch. It didn’t matter how often he did it, Aaron always, _always_ felt slightly off-balance and vulnerable without a visible barrier such as a wall indicating the staircase boundaries. Flimsy bannisters just didn’t cut it for him. Too easy for a six foot two guy to tip over.

Stopping at the second floor landing, he made his way over to the static night vision camera that they’d set up in the corner looking down the corridor of the East-facing wing of the hotel.

“Just picking up the PX device,” he narrated for the cameras and for Billy who was down in the ground floor morning room monitoring the team from the nerve centre. “Aside from a weird noise earlier, this thing hasn’t made a peep. But then again, we’ve gone six or seven lockdowns without it even doing that much, so who knows.” He clipped the PX to his belt and started up the stairs to the second floor. “If there’s any ghosts here, maybe they just don’t wanna talk.”

He fumbled in one of the vest pockets for a digital recorder. “Starting an EVP session now. Aaron, staircase to the third floor. Walking, walking - ow! Tripping. I’m fine. I’m on the third floor landing. Are there any spirits here wanting to communicate? I know you’ve been pretty silent, but it’s only me now if the other guys were putting you off talking.”

Aaron held the recorder out in front of him, making sure to hold it in the camera’s view. He strained his hearing, trying to filter sound through the usual low hum of brown noise from the camera and his own ears, but there was nothing. The hotel was completely silent.

“What’s your name? I heard there was a lady who died mysteriously here. No one knows for sure how it happened, but can you tell me? Just talk into this device that I’m holding in my hand.”

Silence. There was still nothing audible to his ears, but he waited politely in case someone was talking into the recorder. Then he decided to change it up a little. 

“I heard that the lady who died here was pretty frisky,” he called. He turned the camera to face himself, flipping the screen and giving a little grin once he was in frame. “And that she’s been touching men and climbing into their beds at night. It’s not my kind of thing, but there’s a guy down in the basement right now who’s really into that stuff. Why don’t you pay him a visit? His name’s Zak.” He squeezed his eyes shut and pulled a delighted face at the camera. He was a ham and he knew it, but he had to have a good time on these Adventures otherwise they would turn into Nightmares. Not that he didn’t have those too, but things were a lot less scary when fun could be had with them. And besides, if Nina was here and she was _in the mood for friskiness_ or a nice cuddle, then Zak would be the best choice for a romantic ghostly touch. After the utterly shitty couple of months Zak had been having dealing with demonic oppression and now finally being free of it all, he could use a little TLC from a nice spirit. 

Aaron would be a lying liar who lied if he said he wasn’t at least a little apprehensive about them being split up on this investigation, however. It was good that Nick was with Zak, but every protective instinct in Aaron was itching to be down in that basement with them. When he said that the last two months had been shitty, he meant that for Zak they had been absolute fucking hell. It had taken multiple blessings and cleansings and Aaron couldn’t count on all the hands and feet of his family how many times Zak had called him up or ordered him over to his house absolutely frantic because things were being knocked around and his dog wouldn’t go near him without whining and peeing herself. Poor Gracie. Zak loved her to death and it damn near broke Aaron to see the look on Zak’s face whenever she hid from him. Nick had given all the support he could too, but with his own family to take care of it hadn’t been as much as he’d have liked. 

But now they had a new season, with a new hectic filming schedule, and new places to investigate and explore. Zak could lose himself in all the new ghosts and demons and have all new dead friends to invite themselves over to his house and outstay their welcome. Oh well, people had to take the crumbles with the cookies. 

“I gotta say guys,” Aaron spoke to the camera. “I’m not really feeling anything here. This place is as silent as a _grave_.” He switched the camera back around to focus down the corridor. “Bit of Ghost Adventures humour there. Seriously, though, I’m not sure I’m capturing anything at all.” 

He walked slowly down the corridor, opening doors and stepping into the rooms. Scanning every one of them with his ears, eyes, and camera. Nada, zip, ziltch. He rubbed his face with his free hand. 

“I wonder how the guys are doing.”

He had no idea what the time was. They’d decided to have another session before taking a break, so maybe around one in the morning. He was getting a little hungry, and so hoped that Nick and Zak were also getting little activity so they could hurry it up. He waved to the static camera at the end of the hall, then rubbed his stomach and mimed eating. He paused in his room inspections and asked some more questions. Once again, without doing instant playback, he didn’t know if he’d caught anything. 

Turning his camera to the second-to-last room in this corridor, he couldn’t help but let out a little chuckle. “Look!” he called, focussing his camera in tight to the numbers on the door. “Room 333. It’s the halfway room, for spirits to learn the skills they need to function well in the afterlife and interact with the living.” He fumbled with the digital recorder, putting it away. “Better be polite and knock. Don’t wanna just bust in if they’re having a lesson.” He gave the wooden door four sharp knocks, then twisted the handle, laughingly calling into the widening crack of the door that he was coming in.

The energy slammed into him almost like a punch, and Aaron gasped for air, losing his grip on the door, suddenly finding himself without both. At his side the PX device started speaking.

 _RUN_ , it said. Then again. _RUN_.

“Whoa!” Aaron found his breath. “Whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa! Something’s here! Dude, that’s strong! The energy is completely different in this room to what’s out in the hall!” He grabbed for his digital recorder and started recording again. He took a step forward, boots making no sound against the carpet. “Who’s in this room? You want me to run? You don’t want me in here?”

 _RUN_ , the PX said again. _RUN RUN RUN RUN RUN RUN RUN RUN RUN RUN RUN RUN_... 

“Dude! This thing is going nuts!”

… _RUN RUN RUN RUN RUN RUN RUN RUN RUN RUN RUN RUN RUN RUN RUN RUN_...

Aaron suddenly found himself without enough hands. He hurriedly placed the digital recorder on the nearest surface, which was a small table by the door, and reached into his back pocket for the walkie-talkie. It made the usual beep signalling it was working before the lights on it abruptly died. 

“What the fuck?” Aaron stared at where he knew it sat in his hand. “These batteries are new! They’re always new!” Tucking it under his arm, he reached into another of his vest pockets for fresh batteries. The number of times they’d been drained on previous investigations had taught them to always carry back-ups. Hurriedly, admittedly feeling very freaked out by the repetitive command from the PX device, he changed them blind. The motion was so familiar after all these years that he honestly didn’t need to see what he was doing. 

Switching the walkie-talkie back on, he breathed a sigh of relief when the beep sounded out and the display lit up again. He didn’t hesitate to contact the others.

“Zak!”

The seconds it took for Zak to respond were seconds where Aaron worried that the batteries would die again before he could tell them what was happening here. He panned the camera around the room, even flipping the screen and scanning behind himself, but there was nothing moving within in the infrared light beam.

“ _Aaron, what is it?_ ” Zak’s voice was crackling with radio interference.

“Dude, you gotta come up here! The energy in this place is fucking intense!” To Aaron, it felt even stronger than it had when he’d first opened the door, like it was building up to something.

“ _Dude, is that the PX?_ ”

“Yeah. It’s been telling me to run for at least a minute, bro. I gotta tell ya, I’m freaking right the fuck out!”

“ _Alright, keep calm, we’re on our way. Where are you?_ ”

“Third floor!” Aaron shouted, feeling relief bolster him. “Room 333!” Releasing the push-to-talk, there was no bleep to signal the line was clear and he was met with a dark display again. “The hell?” He shook the device, and switched it on and off. Nothing. “I think it just died _again_.”

The PX device was still blaring at him. _RUN RUN RUN RUN RUN RUN RUN_...

Aaron could feel his chest pounding to match the tempo of the words, and his fear frustrated him. He had done far too many of these investigations to still be getting this scared. He hadn’t even checked the Mel-Meter yet! “Yeah, I get it. You want me to run. Can you tell me anything else?”

… _RUN RUN RUN RUN RUN RUN RAPE_.

Aaron froze, heart leaping up into his throat. The PX had fallen suspiciously silent. “What the fuck? Did you just say _rape_?”

 _RAPE_.

“Fuck. No.”

 _RUN_.

Aaron held his breath, waiting.

The door slammed shut behind him.


	2. Billy

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Billy is used to sitting back and watching. He's not used to feeling so fucking useless.

Billy sat forward with a start. He’d mostly been paying attention to Zak and Nick down in the basement. Their heckling hadn’t been producing any visible results, but the guys had been feeling something around them so he’d kept a close eye on the static cameras feed just in case. He’d paid barely half an ear to Aaron’s one-sided stilted conversation through the second and third floor’s static cams, lodging Aaron’s tone as unworried and non-concerning in his mind. That’s why when Aaron started shouting through the walkie-talkie at Zak, and when Zak and Nick quickly left the room that Billy realised that he should have been paying closer attention.

He shifted his eyes to the lower right corner of the large monitor, where the feed from the third floor static cam was displayed. He adjusted the sound, turned the volume up and could hear Aaron’s voice clearly say the word “ _No,_ ” then a distorted bang as a door slammed shut. A dark shadow, moving faster than Billy could almost see, flicked across the left side of the screen to behind the static camera, and Billy sucked in a startled breath, gripping at the table for balance as the image of the corridor rocked, spun, and careened over onto its side.

Whatever it was that Billy had seen, it had knocked over the camera.

He immediately reached for his own walkie. 

“Aaron!” he called. Taking his thumb off of the push-to-talk, he waited. “Aaron!” he tried again. “There’s something out in the corridor!”

Billy frowned, waiting for a response from Aaron. When it didn’t come, Billy radioed Zak instead.

“ _What is it?_ ” Zak’s voice came over in fits and starts, and across the top of the monitor Billy could see him and Nick running towards the stairs, flashlights cutting white slices through the green. Through the walls he could hear their feet pounding the floorboards not too distant.

“Aaron’s not responding on the radio. There’s massive activity up there. A door slammed, I’ve seen a shadow, and the static camera’s been knocked over.”

“ _What?! He told us about a presence. He cut out, though. His walkie might be drained. Can you see him?_ ”

Zak and Nick were thundering up past the first floor camera and ascending the second flight of stairs. 

“No,” Billy told them. “I think he’s in the room with the door that slammed.” Billy could hear muffled shouting and banging and felt his heart rate increase. He had a really bad feeling about this.

“ _We’re on the third floor. Which room?_ ”

“Last room on the right, just before the camera.”

Billy rubbed his forehead. He could hear through the speakers Nick and Zak’s feet thumping against the floor as they approached the end of the corridor. He could see the lights from their flashlights streaking over the wall and floor.

“ _Aaron!_ ” Zak shouted through the speakers. Billy could hear the concern in his voice as his legs finally came into frame, nearing the door that Billy had seen slam closed. Nick was right on his heels. “ _Aaron, where are you?_ ”

“ _Dude, do you feel that?_ ” came Nick’s voice.

“ _Yeah._ ” Zak reached for the door handle, twisting it, then shaking it, making it rattle loud enough for Billy to hear. It didn’t open. 

“ _Aaron!_ ” Zak shouted again, and thumped at the door. The angle of the fallen camera meant that Nick and Zak were cut off from view from about sternum height upwards, and so Billy couldn’t see Zak’s face, but by the shifting of his legs and torso, he could see he was bracing for something. Zak gripped at the door handle again, this time with both hands, and shoved against the door. “ _Aaron! Don’t do this!_ ”

The muffled thumping from the room hadn’t stopped, and beneath it Billy thought he caught what sounded like Aaron calling out. He couldn’t make out what he was saying, but Nick and Zak both froze, listening.

“ _Did he just say don’t touch me?_ ” Nick’s voice went high at the end. “ _Zak?_ ”

“ _Yeah, I think so. Put that down and help me get this open._ ”

“ _We gonna shoulder it?_ ”

“ _Handles stuck. We gotta get him out._ ”

Billy watched as Nick put the camera down out of the way and moved to Zak’s other side.

“ _On three,_ ” Zak braced himself. Billy braced himself against the desk too. “ _One, two, three!_ ” Together, Zak and Nick rocked to one side and then heaved the other way, driving their shoulders and combined weight against the door. It made a loud noise, and Billy could see it shake in its frame, but it didn’t budge.

“ _Again!_ ” Zak ordered.

Billy bit at his thumb, watching while Zak and Nick tried to shoulder the door open. The damn thing wasn’t moving an inch. 

“ _Again!_ ” Zak was starting to sound frantic.

“ _Shit!_ ” Nick swore, and they must have been able to hear more from Aaron, because Nick immediately started talking to him through the door. “ _Just hold on, Aaron, we’re trying to get it open. Keep fighting, G. Just keep fighting!_ ”

“ _Nick,_ ” Billy could see Zak straining at the door handle. His thick forearms were locked, muscles bunching at his elbow. The tendons and veins on the back of his hands bulged and cast sharp shadows in the night vision. Billy knew he was trying to snap the handle and free the mechanism inside, but also knew that even if Zak was strong enough to do that, they weren’t dealing with regular cause and effect here. “ _Nick, go get an axe._ ”

“ _What?_ ”

“ _A fire axe. There’s bound to be one on this floor. I’m gonna try kicking this in._ ”

“ _Right._ ” A second later Nick was out of frame, racing back the way he’d come, and Zak was pulling away from the door.

Billy reached for the walkie-talkie again. “Do you want me to come up?”

“ _No,_ ” Zak responded, knowing Billy could hear him through the static camera. “ _You watch the cameras. Something else might be going on here. The feeling here is crazy intense and.. and something’s wrong. Something’s really wrong. Aaron! I’m gonna try kicking this door, so hold on!_ ”

Billy could see Zak bracing himself, shifting as he judged distance and force. He heard a muttered, “ _Please,_ ” from him filter through the camera’s audio before he dove into action. 

Billy knew Zak was a strong guy. His lungs weren’t so good and so cardio wasn’t his best friend, but the dude kept seriously fit, and he had strong legs hidden under those baggy pants. Even then, with strong, powerful kicks that Billy could hear drove the breath out of Zak, he couldn’t budge the door.

“ _Fuck,_ ” he growled. “ _Fuck!_ ” He slid up against the door again, trying the handle once more. “ _Aaron? Aaron, say something! NICK?!_ ”

Billy had the sound already turned up as high as it could go. If he concentrated, he could just hear Nick shouting back in the distance, and he felt the pressure in his chest ease a bit as he made out the words.

“ _Zak! I’m coming! I have it!_ ”

“ _Hurry, Nick!_ ”

Thundering footsteps grew louder and then Nick was in frame again. Billy could hear his rapid breathing loud and clear.

“ _Step away, and hold the flashlights up so I can see._ ”

Billy cast a quick glance at all the other camera feeds and saw nothing, then turned back to the second floor toppled camera. At the first bite of the axe in the door Billy thought he could hear screaming.

“ _What the fuck?_ ” Zak.

“ _Keep swinging, bro!_ ” Nick.

It was screaming. Something was definitely screaming as Zak brought the axe head against the door again and again. Billy desperately hoped that it wasn’t Aaron. No living person should ever make a sound like that.

Zak was aiming the axe low and to the left, and Billy realised that he was attempting to cut around the lock. 

“ _Hurry, bro,_ ” Nick urged Zak. 

“ _I can’t do it fast enough!_ ” 

“ _Aaron! We’re coming! Aaron?!_ ”

“ _Fuck! FUCK!_ ”

Billy didn’t realise he had his hands over his mouth until Zak startled him when he roared in frustration and literally beat at the door with the axe. It was frenzied, and uncontrolled, and Billy could feel his desperation and frustration through the screen and the chips of wood that fell at his feet. Zak roared again, and dropped the axe to the floor, throwing his shoulder into its now vandalised surface. 

“ _Nick! Help me!_ ”

It took three more massive heaves of their strong frames against the door before the first sharp crack of tearing wood reached Billy’s ears.

“ _Yes!_ ” Nick hissed. “ _Again!_ ”

Another heave, more crackling of ripping wood and Billy saw the door lurch against its jambs. The door’s lower left corner was jutting out just past the frame, enough for Billy to see that they’d twisted it on its hinges. The upper left corner had to be gaping where it was tilting into the room beyond. They could probably see Aaron if they shone their flashlights inside, but Nick had dropped them to the floor when he joined Zak in ramming the door in. 

“ _One more,_ ” Nick panted.

“ _Aaron!_ ” Zak shouted, drawing back for the final heave. Nick’s left arm was at his waist to better coordinate the combined thrust of their bodies. “ _We’re almost through, Aaron. Just hold on a second longer! Just a second longer! One, two -_ ”

On three they slammed their shoulders into the weakening door for a final time, all the power and force of their combined bodies hammering into it and tearing it away. It shot open with the sound of a gunshot, sending Zak and Nick lurching into the room. What followed was a scrambled mess for direction, all of which Billy could only hear, and not see.

“ _Fuck-_ ”

“ _Shit-_ ”

“ _Can’t see-_ ”

“ _-the flashlight’s,_ ”

“ _Aaron?!_ ”

“ _Aaron, where are you?_

“ _Nick! Nick, can you-_ ”

“ _God, can you hear that?_ ”

“ _-the flashlights, damn it!_ ”

Billy watched as Nick darted out of the room for the flashlights before moving back out of view.

“ _Holy shit!_ ”

“ _What is it? Can you see it?_ ”

“ _Fuck! Aaron? Aaron, can you turn around?_ ”

And Aaron’s voice, thin and thready through the fallen camera’s microphone; “ _Get it off me, dudes. Get it off me._ ”


	3. Zak

If anyone was to ask Zak later what those first few minutes in that room was like, he wouldn’t be able to tell them without first reviewing the footage, and even then he would struggle to find the words to describe it. He could tell them that he remembered the cold; the deep, penetrating chill that buzzed like he was licking the nub of a 9-volt battery with his entire body. He could talk about the heavy feeling of oppression that made him feel as though he was slogging through mud and sludge for those few short yards to reach Aaron. He could mention the disembodied snarling that seemed to rise up from out of the floor. The banging in the walls. Those were the familiar things. The things that were easy to talk about.

What he would struggle with would be explaining how they’d found Aaron, chest and cheek up hard against the wall, standing shock still, arms spread at his sides and face turned away from the door. How both he and Nick had needed to practically peel him away from the wall as he was completely incapable of moving himself, even though they could see he was trying. The way it had taken almost the rest of Zak and Nick’s combined strength just to do that, as if the entity in the room was fighting hard to keep Aaron where he was. How Nick had shouted himself hoarse ordering the entity to let Aaron go. How hard Aaron was shaking beneath Zak’s hands. The pressure against them as he wormed them between Aaron’s chest and the wall to pull, and he could just feel the physical strength of the thing keeping him there. The noises Aaron was making beneath every breath, like he just couldn’t get enough air. Like he was starving for it, or it was being crushed out of him. The state of his clothing. The scratches. The blood on his mouth. The bite. 

Aaron’s face he would never be able to describe, though. Zak had never seen anybody with an expression like that in his life. It frightened him in a way that Zak could not put into words, not even in his own head. There was just gibberish in there going around and around in loop-de-loops, and fear that he knew wouldn’t abate for months, and the solid resolution that no one in his team would ever investigate alone again. Never.

He wouldn’t know until they had seen and analysed all the footage just how long it had taken him and Nick to haul Aaron out of that room. Illogically, stupidly, they’d kept going back for things. Some part of Zak refused to leave Aaron’s camera behind once he’d felt his feet kick it where it lay on the floor, though he could not have cared less about Nick’s which was left in the hall; and Aaron kept muttering about the recorder, eventually forcing Nick to turn away for a second to grab for it. He’d also come back out with Aaron’s walkie-talkie and vest, shouting about how the bed was shaking. 

They’d staggered like a trio of drunkards down the corridor towards the stairs, something at Zak’s back hounding him to hurry, hurry, hurry. He didn’t dare look over his shoulder, and on Aaron’s other side he knew that Nick was staring resolutely forward, night vision camera panning like a searchlight from side to side, much as Zak’s eyes were in the darkness. Aaron was little help. His co-ordination appeared to be shot and his feet dragged more than they stepped, but whatever was under his hands, he held onto as if for dear life

Billy radioed to them continually, reporting no activity, no more sounds, no abnormal readings. It was quiet and still. But Zak knew that the entity wasn’t gone. He could feel it behind them like a slavering dog, pacing them patiently, and Zak knew if he only turned around it would be on them.

With that invisible weight pressing at their backs he was terrified of the stairs, and in the illumination of the flashlight he could see the same fear in Nick’s eyes. Wordlessly, Nick placed the camera into Aaron’s hand and Zak clamped the flashlight between his teeth and together they reached out with their free arms and grasped the bannisters on either side for dear life. They also tightened their grip around Aaron with their other arms, hoping that their tight holds would keep them from falling if the entity decided to try and shove them down the stairs. 

Billy’s face when they finally made it down to the nerve centre was pale, and his eyes clearly concerned. Zak didn’t want to know how they all appeared to Billy.

“Aaron, bro, are you alright?”

Zak shot Nick a worried look when Aaron ignored Billy’s question and slumped still and silent between them. Billy echoed the look a moment later.

“Are we ending the lockdown?” he asked Zak quietly.

“Yes,” Zak said without any hesitation. “ _Fuck_ yes. This investigation is _over_.”

“You sure?”

This time it was Nick who answered. “I don’t know what that was up there, but that was _bad_ , man. And I’m not… Dude, even if we wanted to keep investigating… I don’t think I could.”

Zak agreed one hundred and ten percent. He knew he was a bit of a nervous guy if he was honest about himself, but Nick was an iron bar most of the time. Seldom startled, calm, and used to taking the slack whenever Zak lost it. That he felt he couldn’t continue…

“I’m sure,” Zak affirmed. “And for the record, no one is going anywhere alone in this place. We’re gonna pack up in pairs, starting upstairs on the third floor, and one person is to watch the monitor and stay with Aaron until he’s out of here. Got it?”

Billy and Nick nodded their agreement.

It was then that Aaron swayed visibly, and before his weight could fall fully against either Zak or Nick, they helped him to stagger over to the couch. He eased himself down slowly, blinked even slower, then slumped abruptly over onto his side once they’d removed their supporting grips. 

“Aaron?” Zak asked, dropping everything in his hands and reaching back for him, to haul him back up, or to shake him or something. Zak didn’t know. He was alarmed, and everything that Aaron was doing was only alarming him further.

Aaron just shrugged his hands off. “I’m fine,” he muttered, his first words since coming down from the room. “Just wanna lay down. Go pack up the gear. I’ll be fine with Bill.”

Zak wanted to say that he was relieved that Aaron was talking again, but instead the words only chilled him further. They sounded so… dull. Aaron was normally vibrant and excited in his speech, much like a little kid. He was likely still shocked from what happened upstairs, and very probably drained because that level of activity had to draw energy from somewhere. He could just be exhausted. Exhausted Aaron tended to be a quiet, withdrawn Aaron. 

“You sure you’ll be fine here?” Zak just felt he had to ask, feeling his chest tighten with worry. “You’re not acting like yourself, bro.”

Aaron slit his eyes open. “Dude,” he groused. “Just go. Sooner the stuff is packed up, sooner we can get out of here.”

Zak frowned at him. “You’re getting out of here as soon as that door is unlocked.”

The glare Aaron returned was dark and resolute, made even more frightening by the large dark circles that had developed beneath his eyes. “I’m not leaving you guys in here. I will wait, and we will leave together.”

Nick’s hand was suddenly on Zak’s arm, turning him towards the tables covered with their gear. “C’mon Zak. Let’s go get sorted.”

“And take a PX or Ovilus,” Aaron’s voice floated over, once again grey and quiet. “Just in case.”

“Just in-” A warning squeeze from Nick stopped him. “-Okay. Billy, you wanna call the caretaker to let us out?”

“On it.”

Zak seized the moments it took to get ready to psyche himself up for going back out. That in itself was surprising. It had been a long time since he’d needed to do that. With half an ear he listened to Billy’s phone call with Marie Bryant, arranging for her to come over early and unlock them; the other half listening for any banging or thumps from outside of the morning room to indicate a spirit lying in wait. With a PX in his shirt pocket and a POV camera on the shoulder strap of the backpack, he cast one glance back at Aaron to assure himself that he was okay and trailed Nick to the french-style doors leading out into the hall.

Upon opening them, Nick gasped and swore violently. He took a swift step back straight into Zak, his camera banging against the door frame with a sharp clack.

“What?!” Zak cried, startled, grabbing Nick by the upper arms. “What is it?”

Nick shook his head, then turned to the side so that Zak could see. His camera and torch were both pointing down at the floor, and Zak followed their sights. He managed to choke back his own shout, but only barely. 

His nerves were singing though, his hands trembling. The flashlight rattled in his grip, sending the circle of illumination dancing. “F-fuck,” he breathed out shakily. 

There, lying on the hardwood floor outside the doors to the morning room, was the axe.


	4. Zak II

“Found it!” Billy’s call distracted Zak from where he was diligently trying to contain his panic by pacing up and down the length of the room. Nick gestured him over to where he was sitting at Billy’s shoulder, going through the video feed from the camera that had been monitoring Billy and the nerve centre with him. Unfortunately, they couldn’t view the footage from the actual camera on the second floor until they’d retrieved it, and Zak was feeling too shaken to venture out without first trying to establish how the axe had gotten from there to here. Luckily, the nerve center camera had been set up to capture the screen as well as Billy, and had actually caught something. 

“Show me,” Zak demanded, gripping the back of Billy’s chair. 

“The angle is really severe, and I’ve zoomed in as much as possible. See the axe in the corner of the screen?”

Zak nodded. It was just the blade part of it, slightly out of focus and partially in shadow, but he could make it out well enough.

“Watch this,” Nick murmured. 

Billy started the playback. It took a few seconds of nothing, but then Zak saw movement. The blade of the axe rocked a little against the floor. Then with a single movement it abruptly tilted up on its head and slid out of view. All-in-all it took less than two seconds. 

“Play it again.”

Two more repeats, and Zak finally stood back. 

“Fuck,” he breathed, feeling his heart thudding harder in his chest. “How long ago was this?”

“You’d just reached the second floor landing.”

Nick shook his head. “I don’t like this. It had an axe pointed at our backs the entire time.”

“And now we have the axe,” Zak acknowledged. “And we’re keeping it in here. Let’s go Nick.”

“Zak-”

“Now, Nick.”

Zak threw another look at Aaron. He was still on the couch, on his left side in a loose curl, his right arm crossed over his stomach with his hand tucked beneath his body. The other hand was under his head. His eyes were closed, but Zak knew he wasn’t sleeping. The hard lines to his face told him that he had heard every word.

Nick met his eyes squarely when he turned back. He knew Nick wanted to say something about just taking off and picking up their gear tomorrow, but he’d seen where Zak had been looking, understood Zak’s concern perhaps better than Zak himself did, and kept quiet. Coming back tomorrow meant _coming back tomorrow_ , and Zak was sure once they were out of the building not even the threat of being kidnapped and thrown inside of Bobby Mackey’s would coerce them to go back in. 

“Let’s go.”

Once outside of the morning room, they only managed to move a few meters down the hall before mutually, they both stopped.

Zak looked at Nick, and Nick looked back at him. The torchlight washed Nick out and made him look sick. Aaron had looked like that back on the couch, Zak realized, and he felt a bad taste spread across his tongue. 

Nick jerked his chin up at the ceiling, a small movement, but Zak understood. ”Still wanna start on the third floor?”

“Work our way down,” Zak nodded, ignoring how thick his throat felt. It was the most efficient way to pack up. He felt the heavy breath Nick let out brush the hairs on his arm. 

“I admit I’m fucking scared, man,” Nick told him. “Bro, I’m still shaking.”

“Yeah. Me too.” The hairs on the back of his neck hadn’t gone down at all since he’d touched the door upstairs, either.

“We’re hesitating.”

“I know!”

Still, neither of them moved and silence lingered.

“Bro, we’re just standing here.” Nick clearly felt the need to point out the obvious yet again, but Zak genuinely couldn’t move. And though he’d like to tell himself it was because some spirit or entity or otherworldly force was holding him stationary, honestly, Zak just couldn’t bring himself to take a single step closer to those stairs.

“I don’t want to move,” he muttered. “Shit.” He sucked in a deep breath through the tightness in his chest, followed by another and another - deep lung exercises to hyper-oxygenate himself, then broke free of his own self-induced stasis by taking a racing start for the stairs. He wasn’t going to be defeated by his own fears. 

He heard Nick swear and scramble to catch up. They only stopped their dash once they’d come out on the third floor landing. Both of them were breathing quickly.

Zak was hyper aware of his surroundings as they approached the corridor with room 333. He could see the fallen static camera at the end of the hall, along with Nick’s forgotten camera placed against the wall and the single flashlight they’d left behind which, ironically enough, was pointing straight at the dark gaping hole of the bashed in doorway. Nothing about it looked nefarious. It just appeared like someone had left the door open, like with all the other rooms along this hall. But looks could be deceiving. In Zak’s mind it was like an open maw; the mouth of a ravenous beast lying in wait to suck all who passed by it into its dark, horrific depths. Standing still, staring at it, it was a monster. 

One that was apparently asleep, however, as Zak became aware that something was missing.

“I think it’s gone,” Nick said quietly from behind him. “Can you feel anything?”

“No,” and Zak was surprised. He’d built the horror of it up so high in his head that he was almost disappointed when he realized that Nick was right. The feeling was once again as it had been at the beginning of their investigation. Whatever had been in there with Aaron was now gone. 

“Doesn’t mean it isn’t still hanging around, though,” he said.

“Guess we better pack up quickly then.”

“Ah-huh.”

Passing by the broken door produced no tingling, and no sudden awareness of something watching them. The hairs on the back of Zak’s neck were still standing up, but Zak was beginning to think that would be the permanent state of them until they got out of the hotel. He was still on high alert, and startled when he felt the tug on his backpack until Nick informed him that he was just tucking his previously abandoned camera into a side pocket. Together, they made quick work of packing up the static camera; camera and tripod going into the backpack and cable beginning to be wound up by Nick as they walked back toward the stairs.

“Dude,” Nick said when they stood at the landing.

Zak couldn’t believe it either. “I know!”

Nothing. Nothing had approached them. Neither of them had been attacked. Nothing had been thrown, no doors had been slammed. Nothing had sounded out. Even the PX had been-

_RETURN_

Zak’s heart rate rocketed as he realized that his last thought had been a little too optimistic for the situation. He fought against the urge to pluck the PX device from out of his pocket and biff it down the stairs. He breathed in through his nose; a long, deep breath to try to calm himself. He could feel Nick vibrating beside him like a plucked string, while it was taking almost all of Zak’s control to remain where he was.

“Return what?” Zak asked, voice utterly calm. It was in stark contrast to how frantically his heart was racing in his chest.

There was a long pause, at least twenty seconds. Zak was about ready to announce it a random spike of activity when the PX announced itself again.

_WHORE_

“Whore?” Zak echoed, confused. He shared a perplexed look with Nick by torchlight. Nick shrugged and pulled a face, clearly not understanding the reference either. “You want a whore to come back? There was a prostitute here?” He refused to ask if either of them were the ones being called a whore.

“Can you tell us her name?” Nick asked. 

There was another long pause before the device answered.

_BEARD_

Zak frowned, even more confused. Were they just random words from a spirit that didn’t know what they wanted? But from beside him Nick made a loud, indecipherable noise. “Are you talking about Aaron?!” he demanded. 

_MINE_

This time the answer was immediate and unexpectedly, Zak felt himself just lose it.

“You listen here you sick fuck!” He was loud, not enough to be truly yelling, but there was enough volume in his voice that it echoed in the stairwell as he strode determinedly back towards the room, absolutely certain that’s where the entity was. “Aaron is not a whore, and he is not yours. What the hell did you do to him in that room over there?! Huh?! One guy on his own? Fucking coward!”

Rage he had no idea was there rocketed out of him. The band around his chest tightened, his eyes burned, and he felt that if only he could get his hands around the spirit’s neck he could choke the bastard into non-existence. He’d seen the marks. _He’d seen them!_

“Fucker!” he bellowed.

“Zak!”

“Show yourself!” He was going to destroy it. Tear it apart and utterly _decimate_ the fuckhead.

“ZAK!”

“WHAT?!” Zak snapped back. 

Nick was beside him, almost at his elbow. His eyes were wide and worried, but his face was hard. He shook his head. “Let’s go.”

“I can’t stand asshole spirits like that!” Zak told him, breathing heavily, feeling his eyes straining in his face.

“I know,” Nick agreed, and took a small shuffling step that brought him right up against Zak’s shoulder. The contact did something, shook something from him, and Zak felt the hard band around his chest loosen. He exhaled loudly as the anger begin to ebb. 

“One day we’ll come back and sort the fucker out,” Nick told him, fingers pressed against the back of Zak’s shoulder. “But right now we’ve got things to do.” 

_That’s right_. “Pack up,” Zak remembered. 

“Yep.”

“And get out of here.”

“Bingo. You good for it?”

Zak sucked in a deep breath, pushing what remained of the sudden rage down as far as he could. “Yeah. Yeah. Spirits like that just make me so angry.”

“I know, bro.” Nick took a step back and looked hard at him. “It’s nothing else? You’re not feeling oppressed, are you?”

Zak honestly couldn’t tell. His head was a mess and his body was throwing up mixed signals right and left. He hadn’t even _felt_ that spirit, and usually he was pretty good for that. “God, I don’t know. Maybe. It’s this place, man, it’s screwing us up. Let’s just get out of here.”

Billy radioed them almost a second later, asking what happened.

“ _We could hear you approaching the camera, then you yelling, Zak. Then nothing._ ”

“It’s alright,” Nick responded. Zak had thrown him the walkie-talkie as soon as Billy’s voice had come through. “We just had a moment. Tell you when we’re out of here.”

Another couple of static camera’s collected, and then they were down in the basement picking up the last one when the PX let out a burst of unintelligible sound.

“Oh, God!” Zak practically jumped out of his skin. He bent over, clutching his chest. Nick had just been putting the tripod in Zak’s backpack and his own shock had almost pulled Zak over onto the floor. “Oh God, oh God, oh God, please be nothing. Please, please be nothing. My heart can’t take much more of this.”

_SORRY_ , the PX device declared.

“Fuck!” Zak felt like crying. He was done. He was utterly done with this. “What are you sorry for? For scaring the crap out of me? For attacking Aaron? For chasing us with an axe? What?”

_SORRY_ , it said again. _SORRY. AARON. SORRY._

Zak straightened. “You’re… sorry about Aaron?”

“Dude,” Nick interrupted. “I don’t think this is the same spirit.”

“Yeah, me either.” 

He plucked the device from his pocket and looked around the basement. It was pitch black, and he couldn’t see anything, but there was a faint presence around him. Distant, but there.

“Why are you sorry?”

_HELP._

This is why Zak preferred to work with the SB-7 Spirit Box. He wasn’t just limited to one word answers with it, and often the spirits could communicate with full sentences. It cut down on the time spent trying to puzzle out the spirits meanings and made communicating a much more natural process than this hemming and hawing that the PX produced. Zak tried to ask for clarification.

“Do you want to help Aaron? Do you want us to help Aaron? Or are you sorry because you couldn’t help him?”

_TRIED_ , the PX confirmed.

“You tried to help?”

_WARNING._

“You tried to warn him?”

_RUN._

“Run!” Nick echoed. He pointed at where the device was held out in Zak’s hand. “We could hear it blaring over the walkie-talkie! It was you that was telling him to run?”

“Thank you for trying to help him,” Zak said.

_NOT ALL BAD._

“Not all bad!” Zak stared, utterly surprised at the device. He then looked straight into Nick’s camera. “What’s your name?”

There was a mess of sound from the PX, but in the midst of it what sounded like a name. _TILLY._

“Tilly?”

Nick nodded. “Sounded like Tilly.”

“Tilly, what happened to Aaron tonight in that room?”

_ROBERT._

“Robert? Is that the spirit’s name?”

_BAD._

“What did Robert do to Aaron, Tilly? What did he do that was so bad? Aaron’s not talking about it and we need to know how to help him.”

_TOUCH._

“Touch? We know he touched him.”

_BAD._

Nick gasped audibly and his hand shot out to grab Zak’s arm, shaking it with his fervor. “Bad touch! Zak, bad touch!”

Zak’s eyes grew even wider, and he felt a chill start in his chest, spreading quickly through to his arms. “Is that true, Tilly? Was it a bad touch? Did he - God, this is making horrible sense.” He stared at Nick, feeling nausea churn in his stomach. “Remember how he called him a whore upstairs? Shit, did he… I don’t want to ask this, Nick.”

“You have to.”

“I don’t…” he shook his head violently. “No, this is Aaron we’re talking about. I’m not asking this question. You ask it, Nick. I won’t.”

Nick nodded, though looked just as reluctant as Zak felt. “Alright. Tilly, did Robert touch Aaron in a sexual way? Did he hurt him?”

_CORRECT._

“No!” The denial lurched out of Zak like a painfully jarring hiccough. It rattled through his chest. What were they being told, here?

He looked across at Nick, and in the white glow of the flashlight Zak could see that he was frowning, clearly worried. “Bad touch is a term children use,” he said to Zak, voice quiet and absolutely calm. “Maybe she’s not sure exactly what she saw. Maybe she’s a kid. Didn’t a little girl die here in the eighties?”

“I think so, yeah.”

Nick nodded, accepting the new hypothesis, and though Zak wanted to leap on the wagon with him, something in his gut told him that it wasn’t as simple as a child ghost misconstruing what it had seen.

“Tilly, how old are you?”

Nothing. Silence. 

“Have you noticed how they never answer that question?” Nick asked him.

“Maybe they don’t know.”

“Yeah, but even when we ask them how old they were when they died they still say nothing.”

As if to refute Nick, the PX spoke again.

_INFINITE_.

Nick’s eyebrows shot up on his face. “Did it just say infinite?”

Zak opened his mouth to ask another question, but the PX device interrupted him with another blurt of indecipherable noise. 

“What?”

_HE’S COMING. HE’S COMING. HE’S COMING._

“Who’s coming, Tilly? Is it Robert?”

_RUN. PROTECT._

“Protect? Protect who?”

Nick gasped.

“Nick?”

“Aaron.”

“What?”

“Protect Aaron,” Nick repeated.

_CORRECT._

They looked at each other for a split second.

“Run,” Zak echoed. 

They ran.


End file.
